Practice Management News

Recent news and information that impact your practice are included in this helpful section such as recent changes with Medicare and other government-directed requirements/regulations, as well as pertinent practice management updates affecting today’s pain medicine practice.

ADA asks FDA to Expand Opioids Efforts to Include Managing Dental PainJuly 18, 2017 [Source: American Dental Association (ADA)]
The ADA is asking the Food and Drug Administration to better address the nuances of managing dental pain in its opioid prescriber education and training programs.Full story...

LexisNexis Risk Solutions and AMA Launch Verify Health Care PortalJune 7, 2017 [Source: AMA]
LexisNexis® Risk Solutions and the American Medical Association (AMA) have launched the Verify Health Care Portal, the clinician attestation component of VerifyHCP, a robust solution for monitoring physician information that simplifies a successful data strategy for managing a health plan network. (Please note that AMA membership is not required to use the resource. The only current requirement is that you must be in the network of at least one participating Payer.) Full story...

Closing the Referral Loop ProjectJune 20, 2017 [Source: PCPI]
PCPI and the Wright Center for Graduate Medical Education (WCGME) have released the Closing the Referral Loop (CRL) Tool Kit based on their successful quality improvement collaborative that focused on improving the referral management process between primary care and specialist physicians. Participants moved from a 40% to 70% closed referral rate.Full story...

Identifying, Treating Pain in Children with Neurological ImpairmentMay 22, 2017 [Source: American Academy of Pediatrics] The new AAP clinical report Pain Assessment and Treatment in Children with Significant Impairment of the Central Nervous System provides a guide to this complex problem.Full story...

New Canadian Clinical Guideline for Physicians Tapers Down Use of OpioidsMay 8, 2017 [Source: McMaster University]
Canadian physicians are being advised to reduce their prescribing of opioid medication to patients with chronic non-cancer pain in a new guideline for clinical care that focuses on harm reduction.Full story...

Guidelines for the Chronic Use of Opioid Analgesics:Adopted as Policy by the Federation of State Medical Boards April 2017April 2017 [Source: Federation of State Medical Boards]View guidelines...

How to Avoid the 2017 Meaningful Use PenaltyJanuary 29, 2016 [Source: AMA]The AMA is encouraging ALL physicians subject to the 2015 Medicare MU program to apply for a hardship exception. CMS has stated that it will broadly accept hardship exemptions because of the delayed publication of the program regulations. Applying for the hardship will not prevent a physician from earning an incentive. Applications for physicians are due March 15, 2016.Full story...

Consensus Recommendations on Initiating Prescription Therapies for Opioid-Induced ConstipationDecember 1, 2015 [Source: Pain Medicine]These consensus recommendations of the American Academy of Pain Medicine on initiating prescription therapies for opioid-induced constipation have been endorsed by the American Gastroenterological Association.Read more...

AMA Guide to Physician-Focused Alternative Payment ModelsNovember 18, 2015 [Source: AMA]The legislation that repealed the SGR, the Medicare Access and CHIP Reauthorization Act (MACRA), created major new opportunities to advance alternative payment models (APMs). For services furnished from 2019 through 2024, MACRA provides a 5% annual bonus payment to physicians who participate in APMs and it exempts them from participating in the Merit-Based Incentive Payment System (MIPS). The AMA and Center for Healthcare Quality and Payment Reform's "Guide to Physician-Focused Payment Models" describes seven different APMs that can help physicians in every specialty redesign the way they deliver care in order to control spending, improve quality for patients and qualify for APM annual bonus payments.Read more...

Framework Evaluates Top 20 EHRs--and They Don’t Quite Measure UpOctober 27, 2015 [Source: AMA]
Electronic health record (EHR) vendors are required to test their products for usability, but how closely are these requirements being followed? A new comparative evaluation published Tuesday is intended to promote transparency around the design and usability testing of EHR products. Here is how 20 of the most common products measured up.Full story...

What Physicians Need to Know about the New EHR RegulationsOctober 21, 2015 [Source: AMA]
More than 1,300 pages of new regulations released earlier this month outline requirements for the electronic health record (EHR) meaningful use program, with several changes applying this year. We’ve gathered some of the most important changes that will affect your practice.Full story...

Surescripts Reaches Major Milestone in Digital Transformation of U.S. Healthcare with 6.5 Billion Transactions in 2014May 19, 2015 [Source: Surescripts]While e-prescribing of controlled substances increased 400 percent in 2014, with a total of 1.67 million controlled substance e-prescriptions nationwide, this represents a small fraction of the opportunity that exists. Across the country, 73 percent of pharmacies are ready to receive electronic prescriptions for controlled substances, but the number of prescribers who are ready to send them is just 1.4 percent.Full story...

CMS to Address Concerns Raised by AMA and the Federation Related to Meaningful UseJanuary 29, 2015 [Source: AMA]The AMA has aggressively advocated for changes to the Meaningful Use program calling for reforms that will make it less prescriptive and easier to comply for physicians. We have also been working hard to tackle issues regarding the difficulty of using EHRs and how they frequently don’t support workflow and patient care. Today CMS announced that it will engage in rulemaking to address concerns the AMA and the Federation have expressed with meeting the program’s requirements in 2015. Separately, CMS plans on moving ahead with rulemaking for Stage 3 and we will continue to push for significant changes here as well. The AMA is pleased the Administration is listening to our concerns. We look forward to seeing the details of both rules and working with the Federation to respond.Read the blog post...

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